Arwen Undómiel is a fictional character in J.R.R. Tolkien's legendarium. She appears in his novel, The Lord of the Rings, usually published in three volumes. Arwen is one of the Half-elven who lived during the Third Age. Arwen does not appear in Ralph Bakshi's 1978 adaptation of The Lord of the Rings, nor in the 1980 Rankin-Bass adaptation of The Return of the King. In Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings film trilogy, Arwen is played by Liv Tyler, and the film invents many scenes featuring her, some apparently inspired by the Tale. In the first film, Arwen searches for Aragorn and single-handedly rescues Frodo Baggins from the Black Riders at Bruinen, thwarting them with a sudden flood, summoned by an incantation. In the book, Glorfindel had been sent by Elrond to look for the Hobbits and finds them with Aragorn. Glorfindel put Frodo on his own horse and sent him alone across the river to flee the Black Riders, for Elrond had pre-arranged for the river to flood when the Nazgûl entered the water. In the movie Arwen bears Frodo on her own horse across the river, driving the Nazgûl onward with her challenge. During this flight Arwen wields the sword Hadhafang, which according to film merchandise was once wielded by her father. This sword actually belonged to Idril Celebrindal, Arwen's great-grandmother. In the film of The Two Towers, the injured Aragorn is revived by a dream of Arwen, who kisses him and asks the Valar to protect him. Throughout the War of the Ring, Elrond begs her to accompany her kin to the Undying Lands because he does not wish to see another of his family die. Elrond shows her a vision of her long depressing life after Aragorn's death, and tells her that only death awaits her in Middle-earth. Arwen reluctantly departs for Valinor. However, on the road to the Grey Havens she has a vision of her future son, Eldarion, which belies her father's one-sided prophesy. She returns to Rivendell, and for her love of Aragorn refuses thereafter to leave Middle-earth. In the film of The Return of the King, Arwen convinces her father to reforge the sword Narsil for Aragorn so that he can reclaim the throne of the King. Elrond initially refuses, but when Arwen begins to fall ill through her loss of immortality, he reluctantly agrees. Elrond takes Narsil, reforged as Andúril, to Aragorn at Dunharrow, and tells him that her fate has become bound to the One Ring, and that she is dying. How this came to be is left unexplained. In the extended version of The Return of the King, Sauron (through a palantír) shows Aragorn a dying Arwen in order to dissuade him from battle. The movies portray her as becoming human through her love for Aragorn; as in the book, Arwen follows the choice of her ancestor Lúthien to become a mortal woman for the love of a mortal man. The movies invent a jewelled pendant called the Evenstar which Arwen gives to Aragorn as a reminder of their love. In the novel, Aragorn and Arwen give a similar necklace to Frodo as a farewell gift before he leaves Minas Tirith. In earlier versions of the script (when the movies were supposed to be filmed in two parts under another production company), Arwen fought in the Battle of Helm's Deep and brought the sword Andúril to Aragorn. Some scenes of Arwen fighting in Helm's Deep were filmed before both the film's writers (with Liv Tyler's approval) reconsidered the change and deleted her with the sequence. In the musical theatre adaptation of Lord of the Rings, Arwen sings the Prologue, as well as three musical numbers: "The Song of Hope", "Star of Earendil" (with the Elven chorus) and "The Song of Hope Duet" (with Aragorn). In the Mythopoeic Society's Tolkien on Film: Essays on Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings (Mythopoeic Press, 2005), Cathy Akers-Jordan,[6] Jane Chance,[7] Victoria Gaydosik,[8] and Maureen Thum[9] all contend that the portrayal of Arwen and other women in the Jackson films is overall thematically faithful to (or compatible with) Tolkien's writings despite the differences.
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